A new crew of back-to-nature designers picks up where the Love Generation left off

Lindsey Thornburg, a flame-haired free spirit whose e-mail sign-off reads "warmth," designs velvet burnout dresses from fabric she finds at the Oregon Country Fair. Meanwhile, David Hershberger, who creates washedsilk shirts and faded black pauper jackets for his Endovanera line—and who looks startlingly like a young Johnny Depp—spends leisure hours hiking Elysian Park, playing music, and fishing. If the two seem to have their beautifully blissed-out heads in the clouds, they're not alone. From New York (Thornburg) to Los Angeles (Hershberger), a growing group of influential, under-theradar designers are focusing on a new kind of earthy fashion, turning back to the land and finding inspiration in nature, sunsets, and skylarks. Similar to the '60s hippies and not unlike today's locavore neofarmers, they favor a look that is rooted in self-expression and nonconformist ideas. The self-taught Hershberger, who also designs a men's line (both Endovanera—phonetically, End of an Era—collections are sold at his hip Echo Park boutique, Front St.), specializes in deliberately rumpled style: borrowed-from-the boys button-downs that have been soaked in a bathtub then air-dried, as well as relaxed wool jackets with hidden inside pockets, "like the ones priests have to carry their rosaries," he says. Add the requisite long, unwashed hair; a floppy, wide-brimmed hat; and jewelry made by a metalsmithing friend—what, you don't have one?—and the image is complete. "All the girls I hang out with are tomboys," says the 28-year-old Californian, whose muses include Warpaint's Theresa Wayman and Megan Gold from the band We Are the World. "There's a sexiness in effortlessness and being comfortable acting like one of the dudes." Thornburg, 31, debuted her namesake line four years ago with a range of Navajo-inspired cloaks, so ideal for camping or concert carousing that they remain a cult favorite among the Opening Ceremony set today. For fall, the designer, who grew up in Colorado and studied philosophy at the University of California, Santa Barbara, before attending L.A.'s Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising, branched out to floor-length totem-print gowns, highwaist crochet flair pants, and silk-velvet tops, tie-dyed by first-wave Oregon hippies. "I'm interested in things that are naturally psychedelic," says Thornburg, whose influences range from Frida Kahlo to Native American folklore. Right on.